Salut! Soundings

Contact Colin Randall

Some things don't change

Despite the recession, a record winter season is being reported from the French Alps. "Not everyone is affected," says one official.

And so at St Tropez, it will still cost you millions of euros to buy one of these little Mediterranean runabouts, or €400,000 to rent one for the week.

I can never quite decide about St Trop. All that show of wealth. All those people obsessed with how they and in some case their dogs look. And yet if there is a prettier harbour front in the world, I've yet to see it.

I had not viewed St Tropez - the harbour, I mean, as opposed to the beaches - from the sea until the other day, and the trip I took in a somewhat smaller boat seemed to justify clicking away with the new camera (a Canon G10, which the bloke on the mini-cruise pointing out superstars' villas thought had a neat old-fashioned look to it).

But today's news from the Stadium of Light ie so gloomy that I will let the pictures speak for themselves rather than attempt to write another word ...